“Magnificent, isn’t it?”

Amos’ voice pulled Edwin from his musings, and he turned around. The young lord joined him at the balcony railing where he had been gazing out over the Rift and at the lights of the city on the far side.

“I’ve visited it a number of times before, but it still takes my breath away whenever I see it.”

Edwin nodded. “Until you see it with your own eyes, it’s hard to believe that it’s real.”

He looked down, trying to make out the line where salty water met the cliffs on the opposite side of the unnatural canyon. As Amos said, it was breathtaking. 732,5 meters wide, at least 50 meters of depth below the waves, the Rift was a clean, perfectly straight cut that divided the New World all the way from the beaches in the south to the tall mountains in the north, making it effectively two separate continents. As the land rose sharply the further north one traveled, the water was roughly four hundred meters below where Edwin was standing, mere meters from the edge of the cliffs on the ballroom’s spacious balcony.

“Do you think it was the Pioneers?” Amos asked. “I’ve read a number of competing hypotheses, the only thing they all agreed on was that it had to be magic.”

“I don’t know,” Edwin answered. “We’re pretty sure that they were a lot more powerful than our mages, but not this powerful. I mean, they could have done it, but it would’ve taken them a long time. Theoretically, we could do this too if we really set our mind to it. It might take us a thousand years or so, but ultimately excavating a deep trench is nothing special. It’s just the scale that makes it unique.”

Edwin leaned back, looking up. The southern sky was hidden behind a blanket of clouds, but to the north, a few stars twinkled in the blackness.

“I don’t think they did it,” Edwin finally said. “With how much they loved art, I would expect the walls to be covered in their creations if they’d been behind something like this. Instead, they barely touched it, almost as if they stayed away from it on purpose. As far as I know, this is the only ruin we found inside the Rift.”

“I haven’t read of any others either,” Amos said, turning to look at the bridge below them. It exited a tunnel in the cliffs some fifteen meters below the edge no more than fifty meters left of their position, running straight across the entire width of the canyon without any pillars, only supported by a single arch that began far below it, curved up to meet the bridge in the center, then curved back down to merge again with the opposite cliffside. In the low, green glow of the magelights built into the structure, Edwin could make out two guard patrols that were slowly making their way across from opposite ends. “You said the Pioneers are what you were most interested in, right? So, can you tell me something about that bridge that I don’t know?”

“How am I supposed to know what you do or don’t know?” Edwin asked, arching an eyebrow toward Amos. When the noble chuckled, Edwin couldn’t help but smile as well. “Let’s see, how about I start with something easy: The bridge that we see down there was originally the smaller one of two bridges.”

“Too easy!” Amos laughed. “Every child knows that! The real bridge was above it, at ground level. The one that remained down there was probably a footpath or an observation deck.”

“Fine, so let’s dig a little deeper. Aside from letting people cross, what is the purpose of the bridge that still stands?”

“What?” Amos paused, looking first at the structure below, then at Edwin. “Is that a trick question?”

“Inside the bridge is a rod of Pioneer Magesilver, about thirty centimeters thick, that connects the city shields on both sides of the Rift. If you activate one, you actually activate both, and instead of forming a sphere, they form a sort of capsule shape. It’s the only example of a non-spherical shield in existence.”

“I had heard of that one,” Amos said, frowning. “but the question was misleading.”

“Sure it was,” Edwin said with a sardonic grin. “Fine, you get one more. This time I’ll make it unambiguous. What does the ruin of the bridge tell us about the disappearance of the Pioneer civilization?”

The noble studied Edwin curiously, then looked down at the bridge with a squint. Finally, he sighed.

“Fine, you win. I have no idea.”

“I didn’t think so,” Edwin said, satisfied. “It’s not something you find unless you read the actual research notes. Well, this is it: You know how there are no traces of Pioneer structures above ground anywhere in the New World, that the only ruins we find are buried – or way below ground level like the one below us, at least – and that the top edge is always clean, as if cut by a razor?”

“Yes, yes, you don’t have to dumb it down like I’m four years old,” Amos said, waving impatiently. “Their civilization was magically wiped out somehow, but whatever did it didn’t penetrate very deeply into the ground. What we find are the basements.”

“Exactly. And the main reason why we arrived at this conclusion is right there below us.”

Talking shop was fun. The last time Walter had discussed history with anyone to this extent had been sixty years ago when Tordov had still been alive. Seeing that Amos wouldn’t be baited into reacting any further, he continued

“The ruins we find on land usually only have one, maybe two openings, so the surface area of the cut is too small to make out anything. The bridge is as long as the Rift is wide and has supports for the primary bridge that used to be above it running down the entire length. When measuring these supports, researchers found that the ones on the side opposite from us are cut slightly higher than the ones on this side. In fact, by running a tight string from one side to the other did they find that whatever removed them began to curve downward ever so slightly when it ran over the cliff’s edge. This tells us that the phenomenon that wiped out the Pioneers’ creations… came from somewhere over there”

Edwin pointed across the Rift and toward the northeast, past the lights of eastern Pel Mahavir and into the darkness beyond.

“How did I not know that?” Amos breathed with awe, following Edwin’s finger. “That means that maybe we could find where it came from, maybe even what caused it!”

“Maybe.” Edwin agreed. “Except, what is over there?”

It took Amos a moment, then realization hit him. “Oh. The Volarki tribal lands.”

Edwin nodded. “Going there would be a breach of the treaty and would immediately result in another war. Groups of researchers have tried to get permission to go into their lands ever since the treaty was signed, but the Volarki won’t budge. As I read it from the notes I found, the people who figured this out brought it to the attention of the dukes, and they decided that it would do no good to have it spread around.

“It’s not technically a secret, but everyone who knows it agrees that there’s no benefit to having it be public knowledge. Some people would argue that it was imperative to find out, Volarki be damned, others would get scared, and there would definitely be a few young, foolish mages who would think that they could become all-powerful by harnessing whatever did it. We don’t need people trying to sneak across the border and getting themselves killed. Better to keep it quiet. If our relationship with our furry neighbors ever improves or if they decide to break the treaty on their own, we can revisit it, but until then there’s not much point thinking about it.”

Amos was quiet for a few seconds, then shot Edwin an amused look. “So you’re telling me you’re not at all tempted by the immeasurable power and forgotten secrets that lie somewhere out there, unseen by human eyes?”

Edwin snorted. “’Course I am. If there was a chance to get a glimpse, I’d leave you clowns behind in a heartbeat. But if I snuck out tonight, disguised myself as a citizen, crossed the bridge, jumped the wall, made my way through our territory and across the border, there would still be hundreds of square kilometers that I’d have to search all on my own, with no real idea what I’m even looking for – all that without getting found by the thousands of angry beastmen that kill trespassing humans on sight.”

Amos laughed. “I see you haven’t thought about it all!”

“Well well well, look who’s having fun. I hope we’re not interrupting?”

“Not at all,” Edwin replied, turning to find Bordan and Gerrack walking towards them. “You finally decided to exchange the thrilling conversation of the local notaries for fresh air and the view?”

“Something like that,” Bordan said, stepping next to Edwin and gazing out into the canyon. “It is something, that’s for sure. No, we had a question that I told the major you could probably answer.”

“Did you now?” Edwin asked with a smile. Despite Bordan’s frosty reception, the former soldier and the major had quickly become something like friends. This had surprised Edwin, as the two were quite dissimilar. Where Bordan was serious and dour, the major, who was also younger than Bordan by several years at least, always seemed cheerful and easygoing –for a soldier, at least. Edwin had imagined that Bordan would dislike an officer who always had a joke on his lips, but for some reason, he didn’t.

“We were watching the newest additions to our merry band,” Gerrack began to explain, “when we noticed that our robed friends seemed to be… less than united. They divided into several groups immediately, and we haven’t seen them talking to each other all evening. Considering they are our only protection from the hail of magical fire that I see in our immediate future, I admit to being slightly worried that they’re not getting along. Bordan said you knew a thing or two about mage society, and that you could surely explain what’s going on.”

“Did you now.” Edwin repeated in a level voice, giving his teammate a flat look. He sighed, turning around and peering through the tall windows. The feast was pretty much over and the guests were dispersed around the room, standing and chatting in small groups. The mages were easy enough to find, and soon Edwin knew what had caught Gerrack’s eye.

“Ah, yes. That’s easy enough to explain, actually.” He pointed at the group closest to the head of the table, chatting with Lord Theodor and Baron Epherell. “That group over there are the College mages; Master Gregory and the ones he brought with him from Pel Oreis. They’re teachers, researchers, and functionaries in the College hierarchy, which means they care about either the College as an institution or the improvement of our understanding of magic. Which makes them a little… haughty.

“The second group over there, the ones with the white robes in it, is made up of the contract mages and healers. These people made up the magical society of Pel Darni and the barony at large, so they’ve probably known each other for years, sometimes decades. They owned overpriced shops or did well-paying research from the comfort of their spacious townhouses, which means they’re also a bunch of arrogant pricks. Except they think they’re better than the College mages because they’re wealthier, while the College bunch looks down on these guys because they abandoned the pursuit of magic to chase after mundane riches.”

Edwin ignored the rising eyebrows around him, continuing.

“Finally, we have group number three, although this one also includes the ones standing around the room on their own, looking dour. These are the town, village, and utility mages. They probably didn’t do too well in their studies at the College or didn’t care about magic to begin with and left Pel Oreis while the ink on their journeyman diploma was still wet. They either found some nice village or small town – maybe the one they’d grown up in – to settle down, or found stable employment with one of the baronies, maintaining the rituals that keep our cities going. While they have arguably some of the most important jobs there are, they are generally considered the lowest of mages by everyone else: The College bunch thinks they’re dimwits because of their bad grades, while the contract snobs think they’re filthy peasants because they live out in the villages or work in the sewers. They know this, of course, which means they despise the other two groups for looking down on them.”

Edwin chuckled darkly, peering at the distant form of a bald, robed man with a brown stole.

“Let’s just say I’m glad that it’s not my job to get them working together.”

“I… I’m surprised that you can laugh about this.” Gerrack said, unusually serious. “You kind of make it sound like we’re all going to die.”

“Ah,” Edwin said, turning to the major with a sly smile,” but you forget something. The situation is the exact same on the other side of the border, too, except we didn’t start this damn war. The Marradi mages don’t want to work together either, except they probably hate their leaders way more than they dislike each other. After all, that’s who forced them into this whole mess.”